As you might know, I celebrated my 30th birthday over the past few days with 30 acts of kindness. It was truly inspiring and fun – I really recommend this as a great way to have a fantastic birthday. It reminded me about how much doing something kind for others really provides just as much benefit for you as them – it’s a great time.

Without further ado, here’s a recap of the 30 acts. I also tweeted throughout the day – read my tweets here.

Had pizzas delivered to the fire station near my apartment to say thanks for their service.

Donated blood – I really have to do this more frequently! I was a very regular donor in high school and college and I haven’t donated very much since then. Thanks so much to Allison, Jon, and Joseph who also are donating later this week!

Set up a donation page for Camp Phoenix, a nonprofit that is kicking off this summer with an amazing free summer camp for kids who otherwise would never have access to camp. We’ve raised $250 so far – if you have a few dollars to give, I’d appreciate your support!

Dropped off a bag of Bath and Body Works lotions, body washes, and toothbrushes at MISSEY, an organization that works with sexually exploited youth.

I bought my mom a photo panel and a photo she liked of the dog from this year’s Christmas celebrations.

Left two copies of books I’ve enjoyed (both by John Grisham) in coffee shops for others to find.

Taped quarters to a Coke machine.

Bought a game of Superheroes Chutes and Ladders to give to Children’s Hospital – something they ask for on their donations page.

Taped quarters to the car wash and the car vacuum machines.

Made a donation to two fantastic Oakland organizations, Oakland Schools Foundation and Boost! West Oakland.

Paid for the breakfast of the car behind us in the drive-through.

Left a big tip for the outstanding staff at Samurai Sushi Boat, my neighborhood sushi spot, where I had a fun birthday dinner with friends.

Bought coffee for the woman behind me in line at Starbucks.

Put plate of homemade muffins in lobby of our apartment building for my neighbors.

Left quarters on the washing machine in our apartment building.

Contributed to three of my favorite Oakland schools – Think College Now, Elmhurst Community Prep, and Lighthouse Community Charter School.

Gave back to the Semester at Sea scholarship fund, which is a key reason I was able to study abroad in college.

Gathered up clothing and books and added them to the things already in “To Be Donated” box in the closet and packaged them up for Goodwill. I actually still have this in the back seat of my car – I’ll be dropping it off this week.

Said thanks to my friends who joined me for my birthday dinner by bringing them each a jar of jam, marmalade, or fruit butter.

I’ll be sure to write an update on my 30 by 30 list soon (headline – got most of them done, but not all). One of the thirty things I wanted to do was to celebrate my 30th birthday by doing 30 acts of kindness for others.

I’ve nearly planned all of the 30 acts, and I’m really excited to get started! Here are a few ways that you can be a part of these acts of kindness and help me celebrate my birthday:

Join me to donate blood on Saturday at the Red Cross on Claremont in Oakland at 11 AM.

Come hang out with me on Saturday morning when I’m doing many of the 30 acts – I’d love to have company for all of this fun! We’ll be doing everything from delivering in-kind donations to taping quarters to vending machines to complimenting strangers on cute shoes and many more. Let me know if you want to ride along for some of it.

If none of these work for you, I hope you’ll do an act of kindness or two on your own and tell me all about it. Nothing is too small!

It’s been over a month since the last time I blogged about my 30 by 30 list. Since starting my job at Aspire, I’ve been a bit busy but I’m still thinking of my list! First a quick update on the first 10, then onto items 11 – 20.

Unfortunately, I haven’t done so well tracking what I’ve been eating recently, but I have been consistently biking to work.

Complete a 30 mile bike ride

Run a total of 300 miles – only 257 miles left!

I haven’t done a great job running recently, although I did manage to get 2 runs in while I was traveling. Also, RunKeeper now tracks goals so I can easily see my progress every time I run.

I’m 14% toward my goal after completing 13% of the year so far (birthday-to-birthday)

Visit 12 new restaurants in Oakland – 3 down, 9 remaining

Jess and I visited Wood Tavern on College Ave. The steak was delicious. Definitely worth a trip, but make sure to get reservations. (Thanks Greg and Mariah for the GC!)

This weekend we stopped by Home of Chicken & Waffles in Jack London Square. The chicken was OK, but the waffle was excellent.

Enroll in an improv comedy class

I found a class in Oakland this Fall that looks very promising

Eat vegetarian for 30 consecutive days

I’m planning to do this in October – after the BBQ season slows down.

Investigate my family ancestry

Jess has been using Ancestry.com with lots of success, so I figure I will give it a shot as well.

Travel to a new city in the U.S

We are excited to be traveling to Austin, TX for New Year’s. Let me know if you have any suggested spots

Enter Homebrew competition

I have an Oktoberfest lager that I am planning to submit to the Oaktoberfest competition. Just hoping they don’t spit it out.

Floss for 30 consecutive days

I never quite been able to floss consistently, here’s hoping!

Visit a shooting range

I’m not exactly Charlton Heston when it comes to guns, but I am curious about going to a range.

Ride in a hot air balloon

Happened to see a groupon so we are booked for October 6

Build a compost bin

Living in an apartment building this may be a tough one, but we do have room on our porches and perhaps I can convince our landlord to let me have it in our communal space. This way it would be easy for all tenants to use.

Organize an apartment-wide yard sale

We are always trying to get rid of stuff to create more space in our apartment, perhaps other folks in our building are as well.

Cook 12 new recipes

We have a tiny kitchen so cooking can be a chore, but I would like to cook more.

I’ll let you know when this one is complete

Let me know if you have suggestions for other things to put on my list

So I’ve gotten inspired by Jess to complete my own 30 by 30 list. That is, 30 things that I would like to accomplish before I turn 30 (on June 22, 2013). Without further ado, here are the first 10 items on my list:

We are back from our trip and I’ve finally had the chance to sort through our (literally) thousands of pictures to find the best to share. I created a Facebook album here – go check them out. I did my best to caption them to provide context.

Camera
#11 on the list is complete – my new Nikon D5100 arrived on Friday and is looking beautiful. I have no idea how to use any of its many features, but I’m looking forward to both an Intro to D-SLR class with Laila early next month and to taking Sierra up on her offer to show me a few things.

I took a few pictures this morning using it just as a point-and-shoot just to see how it felt in my hands. This picture of Barnum is the result of that mini shoot. Nothing special in terms of photography, but the happy accident of taking several pictures in a row quickly. It’s begging for a good caption.

Fried Food
Last weekend, Jon was working hard (less than a month out from graduation!) on various school and work related things, and I was happily doing anything but work. I was thinking about what to make for dinner later that night and thought it would be a good idea to do something interesting with the bit of goat cheese we had left in the fridge. Pinterest to the rescue, and I found a recipe for fried goat cheese. I have never fried anything in my life, but I thought it was a great time to start.

Yum.

Afterwards, I still had a decent amount of the ingredients left over but was out of goat cheese. I felt the need to fry something else, so I pulled out a jar of pickles we made last summer and fried those up. Also yummy.

Not pictured: Olive oil and its very low smoke point ended up with the fire alarm in our apartment building going off while I was in the middle of the pickles. The firefighters had to come to turn off the alarm. Ugh. I felt awful and ended up passing out strawberries to everyone to apologize for making them worry that there was a real fire happening. Sorry, neighbors! Maybe that’s enough frying of food for me for a long time.

Growing food
The potatoes continue to look like they’re going strong (won’t be able to tell until it’s time to dig them up, of course). The carrots I’ve been trying to grow seem to be stalling, though – the same is true for the basil and rosemary.

We also have been growing “cat grass” that I saw in the store and bought on a whim. We bring it inside every week or so and the cats go nuts eating it. We have to rescue it and put it back outside so that it can grow again.

Gym
My colleague and friend Marc has recently started going to Club One, a really nice gym in Downtown Oakland relatively close to our office. It’s about three times as expensive as my cheap gym, but oh man. SO. MUCH. NICER.

He gave me a 3-day pass and the folks there at the gym turned it into a week pass. I went 4 or 5 times and tried to check out everything it had to offer – a pool, great showers, a running track, lots of classes. I failed fast at a step class (that’s harder than you’d think!) but generally enjoyed myself and actually looked forward to going to the gym. I am going to join for a few months and see if it continues to entice me to love exercising. Might be a key ingredient to helping me accomplish #17 on my list. It will be well worth the money if I actually work out consistently.

B-Side BBQ and Chop Bar
I knocked off two more restaurants off my list (#25) recently as well, and both were very impressive. You know they’re good when I chose meals at both places with meat as the main ingredient (I normally eat a pretty meatless diet).

Chop Bar and B-Side BBQ – I recommend both to anyone in the Bay Area. Chop Bar is also a big supporter of GO (the nonprofit for which I work), which is another great thing about them.

See Jane Run 5k
I’m registered for this one on June 5th. It’s only 5 days after we get back from Africa, but I imagine I’ll make it work out somehow to complete #29 on the list.